More than 3,000 wreaths laid at Fort Bayard

(Press Staff Photo by Christine Steele)More than 3,800 wreaths adorn graves and markers in a snow-covered Fort Bayard National Cemetery on Sunday, reminiscent of the photo of Arlington National Cemetery that went viral in 2005 and launched the national effort that has become Wreaths Across America day today.

The late arrival of more than 3,000 wreaths at Fort Bayard National Cemetery on Friday afternoon didn’t prevent Saturday morning’s Wreaths Across America ceremony from going off without a glitch.

Dozens of volunteers spread out like ants on Friday night, emcee Charlie LeBlanc told the crowd Saturday morning, and placed wreaths, each with a red bow, on nearly every one of the headstones and markers in the national cemetery.

Other communities weren’t so lucky — the ceremony at Santa Fe National Cemetery had to be canceled because their wreaths didn’t arrive on time, organizer Mary Cowan said, but even darkness didn’t stop volunteers here. Cowan reached out to Freeport-McMoRan, which donated the use of four portable light stations to light up the cemetery grounds as volunteers finished up placing a total of 3,818 wreaths — almost reaching their goal of 4,200, one for every marker in the cemetery.

Since it began in Grant County in 2009, the interest and number of wreaths have grown each year. On Saturday morning, a cold chill in the air didn’t stop an estimated 200 people from gathering to Remember the fallen, Honor those who serve, including their families, and Teach children the cost of freedoms.

LeBlanc opened the ceremony with one minute of a silence for those whose last known status was MIA or POW. Then, Fort Bayard National Cemetery Program Assistant Joe Trujillo had a certificate of appreciation from Wreaths Across America and the Department of Veterans Affairs for Cliff High School student Tatten Allsup, who raised $720 during a clay-bustin’ competition this fall to purchase 322 wreaths for the ceremony. For that, he was also recognized by the Bootheel Foundation and given a $2,500 check for the 2017 Wreaths Across America campaign.

Trujillo also commended Cowan, who has organized the ceremony since several years after it began.

“She is the reason this Wreaths Across America program is such a success,” he said. “I know she has a lot of help, but I’m really lucky to have her in charge.”

Ninety-seven-year-old Leonard Pritikin led the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance and the Hi Lo Silvers followed with their lovely a cappella version of the national anthem featuring a oft-forgotten fourth verse.

Guest speaker, 28-year Marine veteran Dean Bearup, told the crowd to look out over the cemetery, at the green wreaths with red bows against the cold, hard backs of the headstones.
“How beautiful those wreaths are against those headstones,” he said.

The headstones represent those who died for our freedoms, he said, and today’s goal was not to decorate graves, but remember the men and women who gave their blood for the rights and privileges we enjoy today.

He said if you could go out and resurrect 10 of those people and draw 10 vials of blood and differentiate them by nationality, beliefs, or more, you couldn’t do it.

He told the story of a young Morrell Worcester, who was so moved by a trip to Arlington National Cemetery he won when he was 12-year-old paperboy, he remembered years later and in 1992, donated 5,000 leftover wreaths from his company to be placed in the older part of the national cemetery, so those veterans would not be forgotten. That tradition continued quietly until 2005, when a photo of wreaths adorning graves in a snow-covered Arlington National Cemetery went viral. That inspired the national Wreaths Across America Day that occurs at hundreds of cemeteries across the country today.

“It is said a person dies twice,” Bearup said, “once when they take their final breath, then later, when their name is last spoken. When you go out there later and look at those headstones, speak that person’s name so they are not forgotten.

“Less than one percent of our population is in the military,” he said. “I honor every one of those who stepped forward and said, ‘Pick me.’”

Veterans from each branch of the service each laid a wreath representing that branch. Air Force member Logan Cowan, Mary Cowan’s grandson, laid the wreath for the Army. He is the son of Mary and her husband Tip’s son, Chief Warrant Officer Aaron William Cowan, a 19-year member of the U.S. Army, who was killed in the line of duty during a helicopter crash in South Korea on Feb. 26, 2005.

Frank Donohue laid the wreath for the Marine Corps League. Luis Montenegro laid the one for the Navy, Cowan laid the Air Force wreath, Terry Kline laid the Coast Guard wreath, Debbie Root, whose father was a Merchant Marine, laid that wreath, Air Force veteran Ray Davis laid the POW/MIA wreath and Dr. John and Cynthia Bell of the Fort Bayard Historic Preservation Society each laid a wreath, one for all the soldiers and officers buried at Fort Bayard, and the other for the Nurse and Medical Corps who served at the fort.

LeBlanc recognized Moises Argueda, an owner operator with The Dart Advantage, of Minn., one of eight volunteer drivers who trucked the wreaths from Columbia Falls, Maine, to cemeteries across the country. Argueda, who is from Fort Worth, Texas, said it was his first time volunteer driving for the ceremony. He smiled and shook hands with people as they thanked him at the end of the ceremony.

As the ceremony came to a close, LeBlanc suggested folks walk around and write down a name from a headstone and research that person.

“They were plain, real Americans,” he said. “They were family people, they were more than just statistics, more than just names on a marble slab.”